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The Top 10 Greatest Sporting Villains Of All Time Have Been Named

The Top 10 Greatest Sporting Villains Of All Time Have Been Named

The people have spoken and it's the Barcelona and Uruguay striker who came on top...

Josh Lawless

Josh Lawless

Luis Suarez regularly gets called "football's biggest pantomime villain" but now the Uruguay international has another moniker to go by as he has been voted the greatest sporting villain.

ESPN's 'Head in the Game' podcast called for fans to cast their votes and the people have well and truly spoken, with Suarez taking the spot after his long list of shameful antics - the diving, the handball against Ghana the biting and racial abuse of Patrice Evra to name just a few.

The top 10 is dominated by footballers and footballing personalities. Joey Barton, one of the most controversial players in English football, comes in at second, while other serial shithouses such as Jose Mourinho, Diego Costa, Sergio Ramos, Diego Maradona and Roy Keane all feature.


Mike Tyson and Floyd Mayweather, two of the biggest names in boxing history who have had run-ins with the law, make the cut - while Australian cricketer David Warner gets in following the infamous ball-tampering scandal against South Africa last year.

Suarez, meanwhile, despite being a great player, is widely disliked in the game and there are a number of stains on his reputation.

Over the course of his career, the Barcelona No.9 has sunk his teeth into an opponent on not one, not two, but THREE occasions - Otman Bakkal, Branislav Ivanovic and Giorgio Chiellini being his victims.

Suarez was hit with a nine-match international ban for biting Italy defender Chiellini in the World Cup Group D contest back in 2014 , as well as being banned from all football activity for four months - though the punishment was later lessened.

Image: PA
Image: PA

The Uruguayan explained to Barcelona teammate Gerard Pique what was going through his head after the huge rush of blood.

"After that - after I did it - I realised immediately," he told Pique via The Players' Tribune.

"We score our goal a few minutes after, I think it's about 10 minutes after when [Diego] Godín scores, and I don't celebrate it as much as I usually would - the way everyone else celebrated it - because I was already thinking about the aftermath."

Suarez was a Liverpool player but in talks to join Barcelona at the time and he thought his moment of madness was going see the deal collapse.

Pique asked: "And during any moment, did it cross your mind that because of it, the Barcelona deal could fall through?

"Yes, yes," Suarez replied.

"Because it was everything - in addition to thinking about the World Cup, and being able to fulfill my dream to come here to Barça - everything had gone overboard for me.

"And I think in the few days after that - before they kicked me out of the World Cup - that's when I spoke with Zubi [Andoni Zubizarreta Urreta], and the president, and they told me to be calm because Barça still wanted me and, and, I have no problem saying it, I cried."

Featured Image Credit:

Topics: Football News, Sergio Ramos, Mike Tyson, Boxing News, Jose Mourinho, Football, Joey Barton, Cricket, Luis Suarez, Boxing, Diego Maradona, Diego Costa, Cricket News, Floyd Mayweather, Roy Keane